


Spies Like Us

by igrockspock



Category: Star Trek: Picard
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:41:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23059423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrockspock/pseuds/igrockspock
Summary: Laris and Zhaban got divorced once.  It didn't last.
Relationships: Laris/Zhaban (Star Trek)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 33
Collections: Space Swap 2020





	Spies Like Us

**Author's Note:**

  * For [refusetoshine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/refusetoshine/gifts).



> Hi refusetoshine! Your prompt about the challenges of being a married couple in the Tal Shiar really inspired me, and I hope you enjoy this treat!

The first night back from their honeymoon, Zhaban is so tired he actually tries to enter their house through the false front door. 

_All_ the neighbors see, and Laris is humiliated until she opens the window and sees him swaying on his feet, bits of blood and the maker knows what else clinging to his tunic.

“How was your day?” she asks.

The corner of his mouth turns up in a bitter half-smile. “I could tell you, but then I would have to kill you.”

The sentence sums up the problems in their six-day-old marriage quite eloquently.

***

“What did you do today?” she asks. They've been married seven months now, and Laris already knows what he'll say.

Zhaban shrugs. “What had to be done.” He raises his eyebrows, a polite inquiry. “And you?”

Laris nods. “The same.”

His lips quirk. “For the glory of the empire?”

“Of course.”

She turns in the direction of the kitchen. The smell wafting from the oven makes her stomach rumble. “You’ve been in the Federation.”

“I captured a pizza for you.”

“Extra cheese?” she asks, not even trying to camouflage her eagerness. Her handler would call her sloppy. She doesn’t care.

“I would not wish my wife to be disappointed.”

They eat with their feet propped on the table, glasses of ale in hand. They refill each other’s plates and mugs when they can, but they don’t speak. What is there to say, when sharing would be treason?

***

Possessions and souvenirs become a code.

A disruptor charging by the nightstand means _I fought today._ A stylus and a data padd for a day at headquarters, filling out endless forms. Bottles of rainbow-colored liqueurs and elaborately wrapped packages of exotic delicacies to show when they’ve been traveling.

On the truly bad days, they leave nothing but a crescent of dried blood beneath their fingernails. Sometimes she lets Zhaban tucks her head into his lap, stroke long fingers through her hair, and trace the points of her ears. Sometimes when he tries, she starts a fight.

Not with words, of course. That would be dull, and anyway, the Tal Shiar would have both of their heads if they spoke about their missions. Sparring is a better distraction, though not as low profile as she might have hoped. Furniture gets broken and neighbors call the police, but Zhaban is more than her match. Physically, at least, they come out unscathed.

***

They get divorced once. It doesn’t last.

Why not be someone else? Laris thinks. The day the decree is signed, she weaves together yet another cover, this one not for the job. This one is just for herself, a computer programmer who’d grown up in the capital city. 

She meets a man and thinks, _you’ll do._

“How was your day?” he asks, and she tells him about a sticky piece of code. Nevermind that it’s a lie; _he_ thinks it’s true. In return, he tells her about a patient he couldn’t save. She revels in the simplicity of his existence. There are workplace politics, of course -- they’re Romulan, after all -- but beyond that, there’s nothing gray. Dying people come to him, and he keeps them alive a little longer. 

He asks if she wants to move in with him, and she says okay. For her birthday, he gives her a pet set’leth, a furry little thing with fuzzy orange antennas. The thought of keeping something so innocent terrifies her, but she’s too much of a professional to let on. She doesn’t tell her handler how much she enjoys sliding her fingers through its slick fur.

Explaining her cuts and bruises to her new boyfriend is a minor disaster. She says she practices martial arts for fun. Then she has to join a studio, and they ask her to leave. Apparently she’s a danger to the amateurs. Her boyfriend wants her to try out for the galactic Olympics and show those Federation pretenders who’s boss. Her handler is not pleased when she goes to the tryouts, even though she makes sure not to qualify for the actual team.

For a year and a few weeks, she divides her life in half. The normality of her new relationship makes her forget about blood under her fingernails and the glory of the Empire, and all her lies make her feel like she’s won a game that was rigged against her. She can be normal _and_ an operative of the galaxy’s most feared secret police, thank you very much.

It doesn’t last.

***

Laris knows where Zhaban lives, of course. What self-respecting spy couldn’t keep up with an ex?

When she goes to his house, she doesn’t bother with the false front door, nevermind that she’s never been here and can’t really call herself a friend -- at least, not to the woman who opens the back door and shoves a phaser in her face. Laris’ stomach drops at the greeting. No marriage certificate was on file, but lots of Romulans hid that sort of thing until they needed legal proof. And if Zhaban had replaced her with another Tal Shiar agent… Well, she wouldn’t have much to offer him.

Her tongue worries the hole where three of her teeth used to be, but she manages not to brace her hand against her broken ribs. If she’s going to die on her ex-husband’s doorstep, she’s going to look dignified, dammit. The world’s going black at the edges when Zhaban glides around the corner and slips the phaser from his girlfriend’s -- not wife, surely not a wife’s -- hand.

She thinks she hears him whisper her true name before she surrenders to the darkness.

***

She wakes up in a musty hotel room with threadbare carpets and tattered drapes, the sort of place you go when you don’t want to be found.

Zhaban is crouched over her, keeping his body between her and the door. Pinpricks ripple across her ribcage. A bone knitter. He must’ve put it there.

“Who’s coming for you?” he asks as soon as her eyes flutter open. “How many?”

Shame washes over her. She can’t even remember the last time she lost a fight. 

“Laris.” Zhaban’s voice is more urgent. “Tell me who I need to kill.”

She tries to smile. Her lips twitch up, but her cheeks are too swollen for them to go very far. “Lost them on Kronos,” she manages. “They didn’t track me.” The words send a ripple of air over the roots of her broken teeth, and she stops short of saying _thank you_ , settles for curling her fingers around Zhaban’s hand instead.

A hypo hisses against her neck. “That ought to take the swelling down.” Zhaban’s fingers trail across her forehead, the one spot that isn’t bruised. 

She hisses when he probes the gash on her arm. From the corner of her eye, she sees a shred of white cloth. 

“Bandages?” she asks. “How primitive.” If she angles her lips just so, she can protect her broken teeth.

Zhaban’s laugh is mirthless. “The dermal regenerator died after I finished your leg. I wish you’d tell me who to kill.”

“I don’t need that.” Her voice is sharper than she means it, but pain makes her caustic. Always has.

Suddenly his face is soft. “Then tell me what you do need.”

She won’t cry. She _will not._ “Play with my hair. Please.”

The mattress shifts as he settles beside her, his familiar lanky form pressing gingerly against her less wounded side. She falls asleep to the feeling of his fingers tracing the points of his ears.

***

In the morning, she remembers herself. He props her up to drink a cup of tea, and she says, “What about your girl?”

“My cousin’s niece?” he asks, and she manages not to cry with relief. Her parents had died when she was a girl; Zhaban’s sprawling clan with all its tangled loyalties had only ever confused her. It’s no surprise there was one she hadn’t seen.

Which makes _my cousin’s niece_ an awfully convenient lie, come to think of it. She decides she’d rather not think. He’s here with her now. Nothing else matters.

“I could use a shower,” she says, and Zhaban helps her to her feet.

His fingers graze her skin as he slides her shirt over her head, and she realizes suddenly that she wants him in there, with her. When she drops her head against his chest, it’s only half because of fatigue. “Come with me,” she whispers into the fabric of his tunic, and she wishes it was warm skin against her lips instead.

Under the thin stream of water, she tucks her body against his. She tilts her face toward his, and his thumb skims carefully over her bruised cheek.

“Tell me where you want to go, and I’ll take you there,” he says.

She leans into his touch, not caring about the pain. “Home,” she says. “With you.”


End file.
